Does it make sense? lower-grade Pikachu card more expensive

General
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1

I have made a few posts here. If you have read my posts before, you know I am in a local Pokemon card collectors’ club. There is something I don’t understand about the value of Pokemon cards. Below, I have uploaded two trophy cards.

Every month, there is a day designated as Pokemon Card Day in my club. It usually takes place on the last Sunday of each month. On that day, we meet, buy, sell, and trade Pokemon cards with other members and some local non-members. There are two different types of sales like ebay: auction style and fixed prices.

On the last Pokemon Card Day, one of our members bought two very very very expensive cards from the same seller. The seller did not allow us to take pictures of any of his cards. So, I found two images of the cards online. As you can see above, the left Pikachu card is a 2006 English No.2 Trainer trophy card from Pokemon World Championships and the other one is a 1999 Japanese No. 2 Trainer trophy card from Tropical Mega Battle.

The 2006 one is graded PSA 7 and the 1999 one is graded PSA 10. Originally, the seller asked for $70000 US for the 2006 one and $60000 US for the 1999 one. Some of us watched how they were negotiating the prices. At the end of the negotiation, the seller agreed to sell the 2006 one for $65000 US and the 1999 one for $55000 US.

I don’t get this. I mean, the 1999 card is PSA 10, representing that it is perfect in every way. However, the 2006 one is 3 grades lower (PSA 7), which is obviously not perfect.

Based on the info, I can think of two reasons why the 2006 card should have been priced lower. It has some physical defects and was released 7 years after the Tropical Mega Battle one.

I think the value of Pokemon cards is mainly determined by rarity and condition. I am totally baffled by the result of this sale regarding Pokemon card value.

(1) What are your thoughts on the shocking result of this sale pertaining to a lower-grade card released at a later year being more expensive?

(2) Do you think the agreed upon price ($65000 US) of the 2006 English No. 2 Trainer trophy card was too high?

2

I don’t have any educated answers for the questions… but personally, I find the hand drawn look of the 1999 one more visually appealing than the cg looking pikachu art.

3

I am nowhere near educated on these cards but I think this is an apples to oranges comparison of PSA grades. You can only compare different PSA grades relative to 1 card, or compare different cards to the same PSA grade, but not both at the same time. You would have to account for way too many factors in justifying any price differences.

4

Absolutely uneducated guess as I never saw these cards before, but based on market trend, English cards tend to sell higher than Japanese, maybe that was the reasoning behind it?

5

The only explanation I could come to is because it’s English and it’s pikachu. Exeggutor is nowhere near as recognizable as pikachu. Also the Pikachu is technically rarer than the TMB Trophy since there’s only 3 2006 variants in the world. These reasons are possibly why the buyer and seller valued the pikachu more.

7

Someone’s pulling your leg pikapip lol. I wouldn’t pay 5000.00 for the 2006 2nd Place Card and 55k for the tmb is too high too.

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8

Not Zelda Gilroy, I don’t think anyone is pulling my leg. I’ve heard from a few club members that a PSA 10 English 1st edition base set Charizard recently sold for $50000 US. There are several tiers for types of Pokemon cards. Trophies are at the highest tier for both English and Japanese versions. If that Charizard sold for $50000 US, it would be valid to say that the 1999 and 2006 trophies beat that price. But, what I am still puzzled about is that a lower-grade trophy with a later release date sold higher.

9

Your club members seem to feed you bad info quite regularly

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The people who visit this fruity little club of yours need educating. Whoever paid that price for the English card is out of their mind. When spending this type of cash surely you do some form of research first? Where is this club as by the sounds of it i could get a Flight from england and back covered by selling cards for 10x what they are worth. As for your logic of if x card sells for x then my card must be worth more as its more rare… well… That is absolutely rediculous. The 1st ed base zard is not only the most iconic card in the hobby, it is also the most desired card in the hobby. The demand for the card is what makes it so expensive and not it’s rarity so to think that a lower printed card aka literally any limited promo or trophy should be more expensive is just wrong. Im being serious when i say this club of yours seems more like certain individuals taking advantage of others than somewhere which bring community together.

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11

For a start it was $40k USD not 50 :smirk:

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12

hard to believe that someone was willing to drop 120’000 USD for two ungraded Pokemon cards, without even doing a little research.

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There are only 2 PSA 10 copies in existence based on the pop report and both owners of the PSA 10 TMB no. 2 are on here and I doubt they sold their copy.

Did you see the transaction happened right before your eyes?

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14

Correct. I have a copy and Scott has a copy and neither of us sold.

Seems like the OP is talking a lot of bullshit. Can‘t take anything serious that comes from this guys mouth (or keyboard).

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15

Could he have got the number wrong and actually be talking about a number 1 or 3?

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There‘s only 1 psa 10 no. 1 trainer that belongs to Jason, and 1 PSA 10 no. 3 Trainer which belongs to me… so no… this guy is just talking shit here… best to lock this thread

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17

I’m with @pokeg on this and something about OP makes this thread really suspicious; I feel like you’re (OP) either trolling the forums, you are very young and susceptible to scams,or you just recently graded the 2006 no.2 Trainer yourself and you’re trying to prop up its price because the 2006 PSA pop report for the #2 trainer trophy card is at 1, and it’s a PSA 9.

  1. This Pokemon Club makes no sense. Your first thread with the Victory Medal can be plausible since it’s a super niche card and it’s relatively “easy” card to find in the market. Pokemon Club members with no experience can make random stuff up for those types of cards but it makes zero sense when you’re arriving a top-tier trophy cards.
    a. No collector in their right mind would casually “sell” at a club member event because what are the odds someone has five figures in their pockets, ready to buy high end trophy cards? If your club is this loaded, it seems super unlikely that not a single member on Efour knows about this prestigious club if such rare cards are being traded there.

     b. Getting two world championship cards usually takes a lot of research, dedication and investment. Casual collectors would never drop 100k+ on random cards without factual backing, and seasoned collectors won't provide wrong market values which makes it super unlikely this elite club of yours somehow has all these rare cards with not a single club member knowing the market value of these cards. Furthermore, your story makes the seller completely clueless too; if the seller can somehow sell the 2006 trophy card for 65k, no way in hell they would be selling the 1999 trophy card for less than the 2006 trophy card...that's like if some salesman managed to scam a buyer in paying 2k for an iPhone 8 and then 1.8k for the iPhone X...like that makes no sense.

  2. The way you spend time precisely writing threads, posts, and provide accurate details about cards and then suddenly making threads that can be answered with casual forum searching and ebay checking makes this really doubtful. How can you spend so much time with such intricate details in your posts yet accept inaccurate info from random “members” in the club?

  3. Also the dude may not allow pictures… but surely you can jot down the Cert numbers on the PSA graded cases right?

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18

Hi, can I be a member of this fan club because I got a $40,000 Lopunny card you may be interested in :sunglasses:

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19

^ This.

20

Listen to everybody here. I’d get out of that idiots club;)

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21

Gary maybe you should become a member of that club and the mysterious man will sell you a black label BGS charizard

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